Sweden, the liberals' favourite state, loves to snoop on its citizens. We're heading the same way

This year The Economist described Sweden as "probably the best governed" country in the entire world. But "governed" is putting it mildly. The Swedes have purposefully constructed a semi-Orwellian communications regime – thanks to a 2009 law authorising the warrantless wiretapping of all telephone and internet traffic that crosses Sweden's borders.

Sweden is often cited as a country with a sensational standard of living: the country which brought us Ingmar Bergman and ABBA also boasts low mortality rates and high social equality. In 2006 the Guardian’s Polly Toynbee described the secret to the Swedish model as a form of collective obedience to the state:

It took the Social Democrats nearly 70 unbroken years of steady progressive government to reach this civilised state of relative equality, high living standards, excellent public services – and high happiness ratings. It needs citizens who want to travel that way. It needs trust in government, which semi-anarchic Britain and its poisonous rightwing, anti-state press forever undermines.

Swedish government is now in the hands of a centre-Right coalition headed by liberal conservative Fredrik Reinfeldt, which makes what's going on in Sweden today even more shocking. Discussing the widespread and warrantless wiretapping which goes on today in Sweden at The Stockholm Internet Forum, the Swedish Minister of Foreign Affairs Carl Bildt claimed that the blanket net wiretapping by the Swedish government is compatible with freedoms of speech and expression, as it is “performed discreetly”.

The idea that freedom of speech and expression can be preserved if the monitoring is done in a subtle manner needs to be debunked urgently. This year’s Queen’s speech made reference once again to the "snooper’s charter" being considered here in the UK. The same "trust in government" approach which Toynbee credits as having transformed Sweden has fooled even their most senior government ministers in a "conservative"-led coalition government into arguing that if the state keeps the monitoring of all communication as quiet as it can, everything is OK. Mr Bildt defends the presence in the room of the man from the government, so long as he remains crouching in the shadows – but without the essential quality of privacy, there can be no freedom of expression.